


The Tuesday Night Baker

by PumpkinDoodles



Series: The Tuesday Night Baker [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain Marvel (2019), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe- The Soulmate Goose of Enforcement, Bakery, F/M, Soulmate AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-15
Updated: 2019-04-18
Packaged: 2020-01-13 13:52:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18470272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PumpkinDoodles/pseuds/PumpkinDoodles
Summary: Tumblr Prompt: “Alternate Universe- The Soulmate Goose of Enforcement”Marvel Style: instead of the soulmate goose, it’s the soulmate Goose as in Captain’s Marvel’s furry friend. The cat uses any and all tricks to get soulmates together, disappearing once they kiss.Darcy meets Goose at her other job. A sequel to How Lovely Yellow Is.





	1. Buttercream

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing!

After London, there is Norway. Then there are other places. The constant for Jane is the stars. She cranes her neck skyward, eyes searching, ever focused on the horizon. Darcy toddles behind her, weighed down with the latest equipment, feet planted on the ground. Jane--endlessly fed by the stars--never stops working. If work doesn’t feel like work, you never do. Darcy has to bribe her with toys and promises to get her to sleep. When Thor visits, she ropes him in and it is easier. Eventually, there is somewhere too remote for a toy store. But even the smallest, most remote observatory has supplies for baking. The thought of sunny yellow tarts on a London sidewalk bubble up into her brain and Darcy goes to their Swedish pantry. Everyone has flour. Everyone has sugar. Soon, she is googling recipes and bribing Jane to sleep with promises of pecan tarts, lemon squares, and raspberry blondies. Darcy finds she has a knack for baking. In tribute to the original baker, whose name she doesn’t know, she develops a lot of lemon recipes. Lemon pies. Lemon cheesecakes. Lemon-ginger cookies. The sweet zing seems to buoy Jane, even when she gets stymied on a theorem or Thor misses a visit.

Eventually, Darcy works up the courage to apprentice herself to a real baker. She works three nights a week learning the differences between buttercreams, the right level of softness for butter, and various tricks she hadn’t known. Her chocolate cake now contains espresso or brewed coffee for richness. Her frosting rosettes are mostly good. The nice Swedish baker who took a chance writes her a letter of reference before she and Jane move on.  Darcy finds a different bakery. With each move, she gathers more knowledge and another reference letter. Her chou pastry is actually good, she learns how to treat yeast, and she can pronounce mille-feuille now. People in Europe seem delighted by the American regionalisms she makes for them, too: hot milk cake, black-bottom pie, Hummingbird cake, key lime pie.

“Very good, but very rich,” a baker in Germany tells her, after a tiny forkful of the black-bottom pie.

“We’re a lot, aren’t we?” Darcy says, tilting her head towards the television. Some American politician has offended most of the EU. The German bakers find this hilarious and have her tell the joke for weeks. They add her red-velvet cupcakes to the bakery’s rotation.

There is a big deal at SHIELD--a building falls in the Potomac about a year after the Dark Elves--but the agency quashes its HYDRA problem and rebuilds slowly.

She experiments with homemade vanilla sugar, ordering Mexican and Tahitian and Madagascar, planting each type of pod into its own labeled canister of sugar. Then she waits for the pods to do their magic. Eventually, each canister contributes to baking of a dozen vanilla cupcakes, dolloped with buttercream. Jane cannot taste the difference, but to Darcy the Madagascar cupcakes have a liquor-sweet, intense flavor, while the Tahitian ones are powdery floral. In Italy, she learns that cannoli are sometimes filled with ricotta. She buys a multi-purpose machine that can be used to make ricottas and yogurt and starts to make her own. That, at least, adds some necessary calcium to Jane’s diet.

Finally, Jane decides she would like to live with Thor full-time. He is working with Captain America now, a man whom they’ve never met, but the two are often seen on the television on missions for SHIELD. Jane adds a sheen of respectability to the agency’s dented reputation: she is no Nazi. So, Darcy packs up her binder--bursting at the seams with recipes, tasting notes, letters to self, and her recommendation letters--and heads to DC, followed by the crates that contain her apron, her ricotta maker, and her favorite rolling pin. In Washington, the vibe is a little different. Most of the European places were small and family owned, so she is used to dealing with eccentricities: that Jean-Claude prefers the cookies the size of silver dollars, that Anton keeps the fridge just so, but the American employees are mostly local college students or ex-college students working at night. She is the oldest part-timer at thirty-two, so it takes her a minute to readjust to memes and their joking playfulness, the sense that it’s all fun and not the serious business of traditional European baking, just like Jean Claude’s grandfather did. “So, do you want to own your own bakery or something?” Alison, one of the college students, asks one night.  Darcy looks up from where she is carefully piping rosettes. It has not occurred to her before. Baking is just a hobby, after all. Something she understands more reliably than the cosmos or whether or not Thor will make it back in time for dinner. A touchstone that she can sink into with her hands. She is only here two nights a week (Tuesdays and Sundays) and makes specialties. She does not have to worry about the accounts, the equipment, or the traffic flow.

“Huh,” she says, “dunno.” She shrugs and goes back to her rosettes.

“You do really good rosettes,” Alison says. “I think you should own a bakery.”

When Darcy leaves at dawn one Wednesday morning, there is a large golden-orange cat out back. He twines himself around her ankles and meows. She pats him. “Hey, buddy,” she says, checking his collar. It says Goose. No address, just a name. “Goose, huh?” she asks. Goose meows loudly. She is about to pat him again when he bumps her ankle with his head and takes off. “Where you going?” she wonders aloud. Then Goose returns, still meowing. This time the sound is more piteous and he bumps her ankle twice. Darcy begins to fret that Goose is a lady cat and she may have a stuck kitten situation on her hands, so she follows the fussing cat down the street.

With uncanny humanness, Goose stops every few blocks and looks back to wait for Darcy. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I haven’t kept up my workout regimen,” Darcy says apologetically. Goose seems to blink wryly at that. “You’re making me feel very judged right now,” Darcy adds. Then, she suddenly loses sight of Goose. “Goose?” Darcy calls. “Goose?” She hears an answering meow and looks up. Goose is standing on the second-story balcony of the townhouse in front of her. The cat taps the sliding glass door impatiently, but no one comes:

_Tap-tap-tap._

There is a sharp swish of tail and Darcy gets the impression that Goose is displeased. Then Goose climbs back down with surprising agility--Darcy holds her breath on the leap from the second story balcony to its neighbor below--and resumes fretting at Darcy’s feet: 

_Meow-meow-meow._

 

“Are they asleep?” Darcy wonders. She goes to the door. There are three little buzzer bells. With any luck, Apartment #2 is the one Goose belongs to. It is now 6:47 am. Hellishly early, but respectable for nine to fivers. She rings the bell.

“Hello?” a male voice says. There is static.

“I have Goose,” Darcy says.

“What?”

“I have Goose!”

“Excuse me?”

“Your cat!” Darcy yells into the tiny speaker.

“I don’t have a cat,” the voice says.

“Well, the cat thinks it belongs to your apartment, so did you just move in? Did someone recently move out?” she asks, desperately. Goose is audibly meowing at her feet now.

“No,” the voice says. There is a click. Darcy has been disconnected. She looks down at Goose.

“Well, shit,” Darcy says. Goose makes a sound somewhere between a huff and a hiss. “Why don’t you come home with me?” Darcy offers. She holds out her arms and to her surprise, Goose readily lets himself--or herself, Darcy will need to check politely--be carried back to Darcy’s car. On the walk back, Darcy fills Goose in on Jane, who will probably ignore the cat, and Thor, who will definitely not. “He’s gonna do grabby-hands, but he means well,” Darcy says. They get in her car and Goose climbs into the backseat and then into the little ledge between the seat and the back window. "Ready?" Darcy says.

Goose meows.  



	2. Baking Mystery

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos!

The weird incident with the cat girl is enough to rattle him, given all he’s been through lately. What if she’s some kind of a plant? He packs his guns and combat knives with greater than usual care and does his therapist-recommended breathing exercise. _In-out-in-out-in-out_. Therapy is all right, but never quite gives him the answers he seeks. He has looked for answers all over the damn place. After the Battle of Triskelion, he read all the books people recommended, the Buddhist philosophy, the post-trauma manuals, even the funny ones. Sometimes he finds himself muttering, “I just need to unfuck my life,” for absolutely no reason.

When he steps outside to go to work, he looks around carefully. No sign of anyone. He counts steps to the car. It’s a new habit, the step counting. He feels like he’s always holding his breath just a little, ever since SHIELD fell and was carefully brought back to life. Adjusting his rearview mirror, he sighs. It’s a helluva metaphor for him, too. He checks the backseat for potentials. When did he get to be so paranoid? He knows the answer down to the exact second; the question is mostly rhetorical. His drive to SHIELD is uneventful. Behind sunglasses, he looks into other cars. There is a guy singing along to his radio, goatee jolting up and down as he slaps his steering wheel. In the next car up, a woman reaches back fumblingly to retrieve her crying baby’s toy. All normal enough. He gets to the security gate and passes over his ID. The gate guard nods and gives it back. “Thanks,” he says neutrally.

“You have a good day now,” the guard says.

“Always trying to get closer to Friday,” he jokes. It is a bad joke, but what can you say? The guard chuckles dryly and the gate opens. They’ve given him an office in the new facility. It is the opposite of Triskelion. All long, low, and sprawling, spread across a wide lawn. There is no view of the river. Some people groused about that. Some people.

 

His office is quiet. He asked for a tucked away office, away from the noise. He does paperwork, checks the reports of the agents he’s supervising, works on the new training manuals. He’s fielding calls about training facilities when someone raps on the doorframe and he looks up. “Hey, man,” Clint says. “You wanna get coffee? We got a break.”

“Sure,” he says. They brought Barton out of retirement after HYDRA was defeated. Everybody knew he was clean. He thinks maybe Fury has assigned him to Barton as a special task, barking out an order like, _make sure he isn’t cracked in the head, Clint, and you can have an extra week off at Christmas._ For some reason, he decides to say that as Barton drives him to a bakery that is near the new building and his place. “What did Fury say? Check up on me, make sure I’m not on the verge of a nervous breakdown and you get an extra week at Christmas?” he asks, trying to keep his voice snarky. Be light, he thinks. Be a normal guy. Clint smirks and chuckles.

“Nah,” Clint says, “he didn’t offer me that. He sent me and the wife to Hawaii for our anniversary and babysat the kids so I’d watch your back.”

“Like anybody’d marry you,” he says back.

“Somebody might. C’mon, you’ll like this place. A friend of Thor and Jane Foster’s does some of their baking, she was telling me the other night about her stuff. It sounds like good stuff,” Clint says.

“A scientist does their baking?” he asks.

“She’s not a scientist. It’s her hobby. She’s single, too, if you wanna--”

“Nope.”

“Okay, but at least have some food and relax, you’re starting to look a little squirrely from being inside too much,” Clint says. “You ain’t never been this pale before.”

“Fine,” he says, sighing. “But I’ll have you know I’m watching my waistline.” Clint seems to find that particularly humourous.

 

Clint’s right. The “stuff” isn’t bad. It’s really good. He keeps catching nuances of flavor in the ricotta cheesecake that are mysterious, but interesting. He is studying his fork thinking _nutmeg?_ when Clint catches him having a human emotion or some shit. “See, told you,” Clint says.

“It’s fine, okay? Good cheesecake. Is that nutmeg?” he asks.

“Sure,” Clint says wryly. Clint is clearly bullshitting him. “You want to meet the lady who made the cheesecake?” Clint offers. He shakes his head.

“Nope. You’re getting as bad as Romanoff.”

“Nah, Romanoff has dedication, I was just hoping to keep you in cookies so I could steal ‘em later,” Clint says. This is probably accurate.

 

He doesn’t ask Clint for the baker’s name, but he does get a coffee refill and compliment the cheesecake, asking the counter guy when the ricotta cheesecake baker‘s stuff is available “because her buddy over there says she’s great.” Clint waves from across the bakery.

“Uh, her stuff’s here Wednesdays and Mondays, she does special stuff,” Counter Guy says.

“Special stuff?” he asks.

“These really intense vanilla cupcakes, man, they’re amazing, lots of lemon things, she trained in Europe and she takes her baking _serious,”_ Counter Guy says. “So, she does specials.”

“Thanks man,” he says. Mentally, he makes a note to order some of whatever she makes next. Would it be weird to call? He doesn’t want to ask Clint her name; Clint will gloat. He isn’t sure he wants to meet anyone new, either. The act of talking feels like too much sometimes, in particular that thing you do where you fake that everything’s good and normal and _just fine._ Counter Guy smiles and gives him a tiny little benediction.

“Just ask for Darcy’s stuff,” he says.

“Darcy. Thanks.” He nods.

 

He stays late at SHIELD that night. When he exits the building, the sprinklers are running. He likes the sound they make, the _shhh-shhh_ of the water flying through the air. He finds running water sounds more reassuring now than he used to: the spraying sound when he turns on the shower, the hum of his washing machine, that _whoosh-glug-whoosh_ that signals the working of the dishwasher, cleaning his plates, the sound of coffee making. He thinks it is down to the water fountain someone brought him when he was unconscious in the hospital. He’s asked who, but no one seems to know. He guesses Romanoff--it seems like the kind of random strange act she does out of kindness sometimes, like an alien with honest sentiment but no experience of past gift-giving--because she has started asking if he’d like to date again. He does not want to date again. But how can he tell Romanoff? Barton sent him an ‘aliens meet Earth customs’ meme once about Romanoff as a joke. She is the alien who wishes him well, even if she doesn’t understand why people put incendiaries on cakes to signify getting older.

 

Like a virtuous and loving retriever endlessly chases sticks, Romanoff will fetch women for him if he asks, so eager is she to see her people happily settled. Just the thought makes him feel his age, serums or no serums.

 

***

Darcy is surprised when Goose follows her directly to the apartment she shares with Thor and Jane. “Hello,” Darcy calls out. “I brought home a friend!” Goose strolls in like he owns the place

“Darcy, good morning,” Thor calls back. When he sees Goose, he perks up and sets down his coffee. Goose stops as well, then dashes forward into the kitchen. “Hello, old friend,” Thor says. “I have not seen you in many a century.” He holds the cat up and grins directly into the feline face.

“What?” Darcy says, shocked.

“You have brought home a Flerken. Goose is a most noteworthy member of the Flerken race.” Thor smiles broadly.  “Excellent work, Darcy. At one time, Goose possessed the Tesseract.”

“He what?” Darcy asks.

“ _She_ swallowed it,” Thor says. “She also has tentacles. The claws are quite fearsome as well…” Thor talks about the many terrifying abilities of Flerken until Jane wanders out of the bedroom. She looks at the cat in alarm.

“That has tentacles?” Jane asks.

“She is a marvel, Jane. A pocket universe unto herself,” Thor announces proudly.

“A pocket universe,” Jane repeats. Goose meows and swishes her tail. “Okay,” Jane says, nodding as if this is utterly normal. “Does she need a litter box?”

 

“Thor, have you seen Goose?” Darcy asks a few days later. She is headed out to the bakery, but the cat has disappeared again. She does that.

“No,” Thor replies. He peers under a couch cushion. “No Goose. Where does she go, I wonder? It would be interesting to learn...”

“She keeps leading me back to that apartment,” Darcy says. “I’m afraid the neighbors are going to have me arrested for stalking the person in Apartment #2. So weird.”

“I believe that Goose would prevent you from being arrested,” Thor tells her mildly.

“How?” Darcy asks.

“Possibly by swallowing,” he admits, looking guilty.

“Swallowing what?”

“The police?” Thor offers, shrugging. “Flerken can absorb many things, many times their size.”

“Oh,” Darcy says. She has already decided to give Goose plenty of personal space. Also, Fancy Feast. Goose seems to find distant worship appropriate, anyway.

 

***

The next Monday, he goes into the bakery after work. It’s gloomy and raining out. He likes the rain, oddly. Pushing the hair off his forehead, he asks awkwardly about what this Darcy person has made. Counter Guy is the same counter guy and smiles brightly. “That strawberry cake, the lemon tarts, and the red velvet cupcakes,” he says. “Get the lemon, though. They’re major,” he says.

He gets the lemon and goes back for a piece of strawberry cake. Counter Guy gives him a card. “You can request things,” he says. “She does custom work.” He does not request custom work. It seems like an imposition. Instead, he comes every Monday and Wednesday for a month and a half. By the end, he knows the names of everyone. Counter Guy is Jamie, Alison and Teresa work in the back, and Sarah does everything. He likes the bakery. His favorite are the lemon tarts. He’s figured out that she flavors them with just a hint of ginger.

One Wednesday, Sarah smiles at him brightly. “Darcy says hi!” she tells him.

“To me?” he says, feeling oddly star struck.

“Yeah, you’re her most loyal customer,” Sarah says.

“Oh,” he says. There is a cat lingering under the awning. He recognizes it from previous trips so he stops to pet it before he goes. The cat meows at him pathetically. He looks down. “What is it?” he asks. The cat paws at his pants leg, walks a few steps away, and circles back. He gets the message. The cat leads him to an apartment building nearby, gives him a distinctly impatient look, and slips into a cracked sliding glass door on one of the apartments. Weird, he thinks. Whoever is inside is playing music. He turns to leave. When he looks back, the cat is watching him through a window. He gets the distinct feeling that the cat is unhappy with him.

That night, he stops and starts an email several times. He manages to get through a salutation and  a few sincere compliments, but he is stymied. What does he want? Finally, he starts typing: _I haven’t had this since I was young. I don’t even know what it’s called, but it was a pastry that looked kinda like a croissant, but wasn’t quite a croissant. Powdered sugar on top. The inside was filled with almond custard? A bakery in my old neighborhood in New York made them..._

He puts ‘Baking Mystery’ in the subject line.

 

Almost immediately, he gets a reply back. Her name in the from column. _Darcy._ Darcy is talking to him.

_Hey, Pal!_

_Happy to hear from you. That sounds like a cornetto, which is a cousin of the croissant, but not quite the same. Looks like this? Do you still want almond custard filling? I can do lots of things: vanilla-bourbon custard, fruits and custard, amaretto, pistachio, chocolate hazelnut, coffee custard. Just let me know what you want and I can leave them at the bakery for you._

She has attached a photo. That is exactly it. “Cornetto,” he says out loud. He asks for cornettos filled with vanilla custard.

 


	3. Chocolate Raspberry

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for your comments and kudos!

He loves the pastries. When he picks up the box, he finds she has made him a few chocolate raspberry ones as a surprise--for free. He insists on paying for everything, over Jamie’s protests, and then goes outside to eat one. It is sunny. The cat appears again. The orange tabby glares from another table and his collar tag is visible. “Goose?” he says, realization dawning. The cat meows. “Do you just harass everybody in the neighborhood?” he says out loud. Goose looks distinctly ruffled by this accusation, hisses, and disappears.

On Monday afternoons, he teaches a class with Romanoff on hand-to-hand combat methods. That is the special task Fury has given him as SHIELD rebuilds. There was some discussion of him being some kind of PR face for the newest incarnation of the agency, after everything went down, but he resisted. Fury didn’t push him too hard. He is grateful for that. Instead, they brought in Thor and his genius girlfriend, both highly photogenic apart and practically meteorically famous together. Sharon Carter mentioned to him in passing that the consultants thought “new blood” was a better choice, anyway. He cannot get the words out of his mind now, whenever they do staff meetings and discuss new initiatives to rebuild SHIELD’s credibility. All the corporate  buzzwords: transparency, accountability, public good. He thinks of Pierce, the grimy, dripping vault, all the good agents who died and refrains from pointing out that they are a _fucking spy agency responsible for Earth-bending artifacts and were infiltrated with goddamn Nazis for thirty years._ Hill would be embarrassed. Also, some of those artifacts are still missing. People are looking for them now. It’s bad form to be too vocal about the failures of your agency. They could fire him. He sometimes feels he’s here mostly as a courtesy, anyway. He knows too much to be outside the circle.

The gym where they work smells of fresh floor wax and plastic mats. It is a brand new module, new agents. Today, they are escaping holds. Romanoff is excellent at this. Her lifelong dance training--despite all the subterfuge, she can truly dance like a prima ballerina--makes her limber and flexible. He swears her spine is like a snake’s, twistable and practically slithering. She escapes his hold again and again, each time in different ways, so much that he actually uses more than normal human effort to hold her. She escapes anyway and smiles fractionally at him. For her, it is equivalent of a beaming smile. They are in a good groove today. The probationary agents are awestruck. They try to mimic her movements.

One of them gets a little stuck and shrieks slightly. Sometimes, people panic when they’re held down, trapped, can’t escape. He is familiar with the feeling, in his way. He goes over to the pair.  “This is embarrassing,” the probie agent who screamed says. She looks embarrassed.

“Let me help out,” he says calmly. “I’ll hold and walk you through it. It’s perfectly normal to panic. Okay?”

“Sure.” The probie agent, Williams, gulps a little. He is stronger than most of these young agents despite his age, so he has to be conscious of his strength. He loops an arm around Williams’s neck and Williams stares at his arm for a moment, freezes up a little. He ought to smile more, he realizes. They find him intimidating. 

“Go,” he prompts, smiling gently, and Williams wakes up. They demo the hold a few times and Williams finally gets the hang of it. The rest of class proceeds normally.

“He’s just as hot as people say,” he hears Williams whisper to another student as they leave. Romanoff grins.

“You have an admirer,” she says teasingly. “What are you going to do about it?”

“Were you not here for Hill’s sexual harassment in the workplace seminar? That would be a definite violation,” he says wryly. Romanoff shrugs.

“I learned to sleep with my eyes open when I was fourteen,” she tells him. “Are you going to visit Darcy’s bakery again today?”

“Have you been following me again? How do you know about the bakery?” he asks, omitting that he has already been. Romanoff sometimes follows her coworkers. She says it’s to improve her skills, he thinks it might be to see who is lonely. She is an inveterate meddler. Right after everything, he didn’t leave the house too much. She brought him soup and Russian food, breaking in through his windows.

“I know Darcy,” she says, looking smug. “Personally.”

“You look exactly like a cat right now,” he says, thinking oddly of Goose.

“Why don’t you stop by and see her on Sunday or Tuesday?” Natasha asks. “They’ve been telling her you’re handsome.” He snorts. “And she is beautiful,” Natasha tells him significantly. She stretches and arches an eyebrow. "Your type."

"That so?" he says.

"A very feminine brunette who will spoil you with cheesecake and not be phased by your talent for the dramatic," she says, eyeing her own reflection in the mirror across the way.

“Twist the knife,” he mutters as he walks away. She laughs musically.

"Aren't you getting too old to play this hard to get?"

“I can’t believe you’re my favorite coworker now,” he calls back over his shoulder.

“Wasn’t I always your favorite coworker?” she says archly. “Milaya, I am offended. You will pay for this when I am the one holding you.”

 

Back in his quiet office---the hospital water fountain lives there now--he eats a cornetto and hesitates. Has he lost his whole mind, he wonders? He types her name into the search engine anyway. “Damn,” he says. “Damn.”

She is more than beautiful. And she takes photos of everything she makes. There is one of his cornettos with the caption, “for my favorite regular.” His heart hammers a little. He doesn’t know how to turn his emotions into action, though. He knows she works nights. They have been trading daily emails and texts about baked goods and little jokes since he requested the cornettos. But he can’t just show up there at night. What would he say? That he’s there to walk her home? Back in his youth, he remembers guys from the old neighborhood used to wait outside for their girlfriends to leave work. Nobody had enough money for cars in New York and it wasn’t unusual to walk a girl home back then. The memory of watching them out the window when he was little is suddenly vivid and alive: young women trooping out of closed business with their purses, lipstick clearly reapplied for kissing, while the guys stood outside in the dark and talked nonsense, smoking cigarettes. Would he think she was nuts?

He scrolls through her posts and then stops. Goose. She has Goose. It is evident that Goose lives with her. Thor seems especially fond of Goose. There is a photo of the cat captioned, “look who wandered home with me today at 6am?”

It is dated the day of the cat girl incident. “Damn,” he repeats. She is cat girl. It makes perfect sense. The cat was probably outside the bakery and then it led her on one of its merry chases to his apartment. He shakes his head at his own stupidity. Then he gets brave. He texts.

_Would it be weird if I stopped by to see you on Tuesday? If that seems weird, say no, please, but I really wanted to thank you in person._

Her response is almost immediate.

_I’d love that. Please, come by. I’d love to meet you!_

 

***

Upstairs in Jane’s lab, Darcy does a little dance in her chair. “Customer Cutie wants to meet, Jane!” she says. “I have been waiting for this moment.”

“How do you know he’s cute?” Jane says, looking over.

“Um, everyone says so. Jamie, Alison, Natasha…” Darcy lists.

“If Nat says so,” Jane admits.

“Even Clint, but Clint says he’s being all weird since the Nazi business,” Darcy explains.

“Clint thinks guys are cute who don’t wear cowboy hats?” Jane says archly.

“That’s the thing, he could wear a cowboy hat, I don’t know! The mystery is exciting,” Darcy says buoyantly. “I have to wait until Tuesday, though. God, I hope he shows.”

“Sure,” Jane says, then turns her head. Goose is scratching at the door. “Goose stop, we’re sneaking you around here, you gotta be chill,” Jane scolds.

“Can she understand that?” Darcy asks curiously.

“Thor says Flerkens understand English. She liked your strawberry fritters, apparently,” Jane says.

“You ate the whole tray?” Darcy says, gobsmacked. “I thought Thor did!”

Goose meows.

 

Thirty minutes later, they are observing some readouts when Goose leaps high enough to hit the door open button. Darcy turns as Goose’s tail disappears around the corner. “Come back here!” Darcy says, giving chase. Goose is fleeing onto an elevator when Darcy catches up. “Ha!” she says. “Small, enclosed box my little friend. Whatcha gonna do?”

Goose blinks at her. Someone has already pressed a button, so Darcy is stuck riding up upstairs. Goose sits placidly as the elevator goes _ding-ding._

The door opens. Fury is standing there, glowering. At the sight of Goose, he suddenly backs up. “Oh, hell, no,” he yells. “The last time I trusted you in a small space, I lost an eye!” He points at Goose.

“Goose took your eye?” Darcy asks, but Goose suddenly runs forward and Fury is too busy dodging the cat to answer.

Darcy gives chase again. She follows Goose through a warren of SHIELD offices, waving at Nat and Cameron Klein, yelling “my dude!” when she sees Clint napping in a chair. Finally, Goose rounds a corner and dashes into a cracked office door. “Goose!” Darcy says, sighing. She knocks politely and sticks her head in. “I am so sorry,” she begins, “my cat is rude.”

The extraordinarily good-looking guy holding Goose looks up. His eyes widen. “Darcy?” he says. Then she sees the box of mostly-eaten cornettos on his desk. Her note is scrawled inside the lid.

“Oh my God,” she says. “It’s you.” She gives him a double-wave. “Hi,” she says, feeling herself blush. Natasha did not lie. He is so handsome.

“Why don’t you sit down? I mean, if you have a minute?” he asks.

“Yeah,” she says. “I’ve got a minute.” For him, she has lots.

“I love these things,” he tells her, eyes alight as he gestures to the pastry box. “It’s, uh, it’s been tough lately and your baking, it kinda gave me something new to look forward to, you know?”

“Really?” she says, delighted. He nods. "That's very sweet," she tells him.

"It's just the truth," he says. He asks her questions about all the places she’s been with Jane. They talk so happily that Darcy suddenly realizes she’s been there an hour and apologizes. “Please don’t,” he says softly. He deposits Goose on his desk and walks her to the door, even though it is only three steps or so. “Darcy,” he says.

“Yeah?” she says, biting her lip. She hopes her smile is encouraging. It must be. He leans down and brushes his mouth lightly against hers. He tastes like her chocolate raspberry filling. She stares into his eyes.

“Have dinner with me tonight?” he asks.

“Yup,” she says. Neither of them notice that Goose has disappeared.

 

When she goes back upstairs, Darcy is a bit dazed. There was a little more kissing. “Where’s Goose?” Jane asks.

“I met him,” Darcy says dreamily. “Goose took me right to him. We’re going on a date tonight.”

“Your cornetto guy?” Jane asks. Darcy nods. “Is he that cute?” Jane says.

“Mmm-hmm,” Darcy says.

“What’s his name again?” Jane asks.

“Oh, Jane, this is the part you’re not going to believe,” Darcy says.

 

 


	4. She Says Wow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos!

“You’re kidding,” Jane says, after Darcy pronounces the name out loud. It feels strange on her tongue, like something she shouldn’t say out loud. “That’s Cornetto Guy? We’ve been hearing people mention him around here forever!”

“No kidding,” Darcy says. “Isn’t it wild? Speaking of, can I leave early today? Since I have a hot date and all?”

“Yes,” Jane says. “I wonder where Goose went?”

“I have this feeling Goose will be back,” Darcy says out loud. “Like, maybe, Goose has things?”

“The Flerken has things?” Jane says.

“Uh-huh,” Darcy says. “We should ask Thor.”

“Thor will know,” Jane agrees.

 

***

Jack Rollins is walking through SHIELD’s parking lot when he hears it. A cry of distress. He looks around. The small animal cries again. “Where are you, little pet?” he says out loud. Jack is happy to be able to use his natural Australian accent again, now that his HYDRA undercover work is over. He can talk without thinking of vowels first. It is bloody fucking great. Also, the non-impending threat of death is pretty swell. He coos at the animal, looking under all the cars, following the sound. His phone rings. “G’day, asshole,” he says. It’s Brock.

“I gotta cancel the bar thing,” Brock says. “You and Barton go without me.”

“Are you flaking out on us, mate?” Jack asks. Rumlow has been slightly anti-social since the HYDRA Uprising, but hell, they are all a little dented. He and Barton have tried to draw him out. He knows Romanoff tries, too, with everyone, even Cap. There is the Barnes situation. Jack is happy to have Thor on the team to lighten the mood. Thor reminds Jack of nothing so much as a surfer from Bondi.

“Nah, I got a date,” Rumlow says, sounding happy.

“Good,” Jack says. “There you are, pretty thing--” He has spotted the cat.

“What are you doing?” Rumlow asks.

“I just found an injured cat in the parking lot,” Jack explains. “I gotta go, I’m going to lose ‘im.” The cat is limpingly fleeing; Jack is afraid he will lose it.

“What kinda cat--?” he hears Brock say as they are disconnected. Jack pursues the cat all the way to the edge of the parking lot. It overlooks SHIELD’s new running track, designed so the new agents can do timed laps during training. Jack can see Captain America looping around the track rapidly. As he passes another man, Cap calls out.

“On your left!” he says. Finally, the man stops. The cat has gone right up the edge of the track and is meowing. Jack follows. The other man is leaning down to pet the injured cat.

“Old man drives me crazy,” the man tells Jack, smiling. “This your cat?”

“No, I just heard him crying,” Jack begins, feeling a little flustered. The guy running with Cap is good-looking. Brown eyes, warm smile, close-cropped hair. Jack knows he’s seen him somewhere with Cap, but they’ve never talked. “I was thinking of taking him to a clinic, having that foot checked out,” he babbles. The man continues smiling. It’s a good smile.

“Sam Wilson,” he says and Jack reaches out to take his hand as Cap completes another lap. “You Australian or something? That’s a sweet accent, man,” Sam says.

“Jack Rollins,” he says, flattered. “I’m from Perth. Originally.” Jack realizes he is still holding onto Sam’s hand as Cap stops. He drops it with a chagrined look. What is wrong with him, he wonders? You jump out of planes, his mind scolds.

“Am I interrupting something?” Cap teases, because behind the Boy Scout aura, he is a damn bloody troll. And he’s been in a great mood all afternoon.

“Actually, yeah,” Sam says. He reaches down and picks up the cat gently. “I’m taking this cat to a vet and then I’m picking up your coworker, Cap.” Jack’s jaw drops. Sam winks at him. Steve laughs.

“By all means, Sam,” Steve says. “Rollins is single, so he won’t be leading you astray or hiding a secret spouse, I approve.”

“He’s always watching out for my delicate virtue,” Sam jokes. “He’s got those old man manners.”

“Have fun, kids!” Steve says and resumes jogging.

“He’s all smug because he has a date tonight,” Sam adds.

“I’m parked over here,” Jack explains, gesturing to the lot.

“So,” Sam says as they walk, “how’d a guy from Perth end up on STRIKE Alpha?” His surprise must show. “What, you think Natasha Romanoff hasn’t talked you up to me ten times already?” Sam asks.

“Well,” Jack says, blushing because, yes, Romanoff would, “there were these bloody Nazis everywhere, all mad as cut snakes, and Hill needed Rumlow to have at least one clean partner…”

“All the way to the other side of the damn world,” Sam says, shaking his head. “Did none of y’all think to call in the Air Force?” Jack laughs then, a wild, sound that feels high-pitched and strange. It’s been a long time since he’s been this giddy. For all those months with HYDRA, he mostly grunted.

 

The second time it happens, the moment of giddiness, they are kissing in the exam room of the emergency vet. The vet walks in and asks where Goose is. Jack looks at the tabletop scale and realizes the cat is missing. “Bloody hell,” he says. “Where’d he go?” He looks at Sam. Sam shrugs.

“It appears that our tabby friend is AWOL,” he says. Sam is the personification of coolness, Jack realizes. The entire building is searched. No cat. It is only the presumed sanity of the front desk staff and the little photo they took of Goose that proves she was there at all. Everyone is apologetic, but Jack is perplexed. It wasn’t that long a kiss. He would have--should have--noticed a door opening. They both give the practice their information in case the cat is found later. The vet doesn’t make them pay an office visit. In the parking lot, Sam looks at Jack. “How do you feel about dinner?” he asks. “Since I lost your cat?”

“It might begin to make amends,” Jack says, a little surprised at his own daring.

 

***

Darcy is meeting him at a restaurant. She gets out of her car and circles it slowly, breathing deeply, just to calm down a fraction. Her heart is racing. She smoothes down her outfit and goes towards the restaurant’s front door. She sees him before he sees her, telling the hostess that she’s meeting him. He looks up just as she makes it to the table and his whole face just lights up. “Hi,” she says. Practically before she can finish the syllable, he is standing up.

“Hi,” he says back, running a hand through his hair. Every time he moves, she wants to say _wow.  Wow,_ she thinks, as he pulls a chair out for her and then scoots it under the table smoothly. _Wow,_ she thinks, when his fingers brush her shoulder. He is a lot of _wow._

 

He sits down again. They are smiling at each other. Darcy laughs like an idiot. “What?” he says.

“I feel like my face is going to hurt from smiling so much,” she says, ducking her head. She’s afraid he’ll think that’s stupid. As if he’s read her mind, he shakes his head.

“I can’t stop smiling, either,” he says. “And I’m not a smiley guy. Not like you, anyway--”

“You have a great smile,” she says, then the words register. “What do you mean, ‘like me’?” she asks, more piquantly. She’s gonna tease him so much for this, if he means it as a man versus woman thing.

“You can tell you mostly smile, not frown,” he tells her. “You’re happy.” He says it with such gentleness that she melts a little. Darcy leans in.

“Would you smile or frown if I asked if we could skip dinner and go straight to your place?” she asks. He blinks at her for a second, but then he’s on his feet.

 

Darcy laughs for several minutes when she finds out he’s the Rude Guy from Apartment #2. “I’m really sorry about that,” he says, walking her inside. She is giggling against him. They have been kissing in the parking lot. “I shouldn’t have been so abrupt, I was nervous about strangers,” he explains. A little strand of her hair rubs against his jaw. It smells like green apple.

“No, no,” she says, waving. Her fingers rub his chest as he unlocks the door to his apartment. “Goose kept dragging me back here. Five times,” she says, laughing. “I thought I’d get arrested for stalking you.”

“No,” he says, pulling her inside. They start kissing as soon as the door is shut. He lifts her easily and carries her into the bedroom. He keeps it warm in here to help him sleep, but it has never felt as good as it does now, with her underneath him. They are kissing when he stops her for a second. “You’re sure?” he says softly. He puts his own hand across hers; she has it poised on his chest, fingers curling around his collar. He rubs her hand gently. “I don’t want to pressure you,” he says, trying to convey that it is safe for her to say no, walk away, leave the apartment, if he is too much. He knows he is too much sometimes. He has baggage. She laughs in his face then.

“Sugar,” she drawls archly, “has nobody told you I’m the girl who tased Thor?”

 

His laugh is joyful. The sex is too. He has forgotten that joy can feel so erotic. Or vice versa. It is difficult to untangle his thoughts when they’re connected like this. He is terribly afraid he was in love with her from the first lemon tart and getting to see her naked has wrecked him. It has been years since he was this vulnerable, close enough to another person to even risk being wrecked. It feels amazing. He wants to keep feeling that. It doesn’t hurt his ego that she mouths _wow_ when he takes his clothes off.

 

He sighs as they’re curled up together. She is tucked under his arm, her body soft and full. Everything about her is soft and warm, he thinks. Not just physically, emotionally. She is all good things, nothing sharp and deceptive and mean, like what has characterized large chunks of his life, especially the parts with HYDRA in them. “What?” she says teasingly. “Disappointed?”

“God, no,” he says, smiling. “Barton tried to get me to meet you. I was stupid. I’m going to have to apologize.”

“Eh,” she says. “Buy him some beer and nachos, he’ll forgive you just about everything. That’s what Laura says.”

“Laura who?” he asks.

“You don’t know about Laura?” she says, raising an eyebrow. “Okay then.” She cuddles him again.

“You’re not going to tell me?” he asks.

“Nope,” she says. He tickles her until she shrieks, but she doesn’t yield. That leads to more sex, this time with even more laughter. He threatens to kiss her into giving up her secrets. “I’ll never betray Barton!” she jokes. “I need his recipe for beer cheese soup.” This sounds half-serious. It makes him laugh more.

“Just wait, Darcy Lewis,” he tells her. “I’ll kiss it out of you.”

“Oh, that was terrifying, I’m petrified,” she sasses him. She is happy, he thinks. She trusts him enough to joke.

“You better be,” he says and his face does hurt from smiling.

“Start now,” she tells him, playfully making duck face. He grins and begins crawling down the bed. “Hey, mister,” she says, half sitting up, “where are you going?”

“I never said _where_ I would kiss you,” he says. She throws her head back and laughs again.

  


***

Maria Hill opens her apartment door. She is in the middle of an intense conversation with Fury about SHIELD’s latest mission in London, when she stops. There is an orange cat on her sofa. The cat meows. “Sir,” she says into the phone, “I think your old cat is in my apartment.”

“Just don’t pick it up or let it near your face,” Fury grumbles.

“Okay,” Maria says nervously. She eyes Goose.

“How does she look?” he asks. “Is she doing okay?”

“What?” Maria says.

“Has Goose been eating enough? She likes wet food with her dry food, Hill. She gets choked if you just try to feed her dry. Now they have those slow bowls, she might need that….”

 

***

Darcy wakes up alone in his bed. It’s a good bed. She wouldn’t mind spending lots of nights here. She is half in love with him already. She thinks it started for her when he picked the simplest, purest cornetto, instead of a trendy one. She gets up, puts on one of his cotton shirts, and goes to the kitchen. He is making coffee and half-turns when she enters. He grins. She slips her arms around his belly under his t-shirt. “Good morning, gorgeous,” he says.

“Hey,” she says. The muscles of his shoulders are strong.

“I thought we could go into work together,” he says.

“Mmm-hmm,” Darcy says. He smells like sandalwood soap.

 

That, of course, is the moment he gets an urgent work call and has to leave immediately.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, somebody said I was running out of space to keep this going and my maniac brain just went:
> 
>  


	5. We Appreciate Your Compliance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos.

Darcy is stupidly happy, even though he is gone for a few days. She makes raspberry-filled eclairs on her next bakery shift. Raspberry reminds her of him. Once they’re all decorated, she slides them into the cooled case and smiles to herself. Next, she’s making chocolate torte. He likes chocolate. He’s told her that it makes him feel all warm.

 

***

Somewhere across town, Maria Hill is chasing Goose down an alley, carrying a collapsible cat bag. “Damn you,” she says flatly to the cat, when it hops a fence. “Just because Fury loves you, I will not be defeated!” She decides to try an end run. “Take the next alley,” she mutters to herself, running. “I’m going to read Fury the riot act. I do all the hard work and he just swoops in with his fancy trenchcoats…”

She turns, still mumbling, when she sees the guy with the dog. The dog is straining its leash to smell the Flerken. “Nooooooooo,” Maria yells. “Get back! That’s not a normal cat!” Luckily, the guy is either smart or quick or both. He pulls his pit bull back as the Flerken’s tentacles emerge and Maria rushes over to place herself between them and Goose. She has fed Goose Fancy Feast and bought catnip toys. She thinks she has the best chance of surviving. “Ahhhhhh!” she roars back at Goose, as the dog freaks out, scrambling backwards, and the man swears.

“Holy shit--” he begins, as Goose’s tentacles retract, and Maria turns to him.

“You okay?” she said, looking him over. He appears uninjured. He’s a big guy in dark clothes. The dog wags its tail at Maria.

“Yeah,” he says, “because you Brendan Fraser’d at the Mummy Cat.” He chuckles. Goose meows. “I think I owe you a beer for saving my dog, lady.” Maria looks at him. Marine haircut, New York accent, vaguely familiar face. She knows him from somewhere.

“I’m going to take you up on that,” she says, “because I have an electronic SHIELD NDA for you to sign.”

“Oh, yeah?” he says. “You guys weaponizing cats now?” he asks, as she retrieves the soft-sided cat carrier from where she’d dropped it.

“That,” she says, “is not my work. But my boss likes cats.” She sets the carrier on the ground and to her surprise, Goose gets in. “Thank you,” Maria tells Goose.

“I was always more of a dog person,” he says.

“Me, too,” she says, as they walk towards the bar across the street. It has a pet-friendly patio. This is not a coincidence, though Maria will not understand that until later, when she and Natasha figure out what the cat has been doing.

They order beers and she makes him sign the NDA on her phone as they drink. The dog is well-behaved, she notices. “Thanks,” she says, as he fills in his signature with her stylo.

“Not my first rodeo with classified government information,” he says, grinning. Maria is slightly alarmed when she realizes his smile is sexy. Sexy and almost cute? He is practically radiating charm in her direction.  _No, she thinks, I do not have time for this. I have...trips planned. I decided not to catch feelings in 2012._

“We appreciate your compliance,” she tells him, rising from the outdoor table and reaching for Goose.

“You’re just leaving me, after all we’ve been through?” he teases.

“I’m glad you were unharmed, sir,” she says.

“Frank,” he tells her retreating back. “I don’t get your name?” he calls out. She turns back and looks at him. He’s actually stood up to watch her go.

“Maria,” she says. “Maria Hill.” His face goes a little funny, but she misses it. She’s already a half-block away, thinking about the latest incident report from Bolivia. She is too busy for relationships.

  


Maria is still too busy for relationships two days later, when she leaves SHIELD, trailed by a meowing Goose, and finds him sitting on her car bumper. “This is my work vehicle,” she tells him, petting the dog. Goose hops on the roof and hisses.

“Uh-huh,” Frank says. He takes a swig from the cup of coffee he’s holding.

“Why are you here?” Maria asks.

“I keep seeing your boss’s cat,” he says. His expression is wry.

“There are a lot of orange cats,” she tells him.

“Not many named Goose,” he says. He looks up at her. “Maria,” he says.

“Yeah?” she says.

“It’s my favorite name,” he says.

“I’m pretty fond of it, too,” she says, opening her car door. “Well?”

“Well, what?” he asks.

“Are you getting in the car, Mr. Castle?” she asks.

“You knew?” he says, standing up.

“I’m the assistant director of SHIELD,” she says. “Also, the cat keeps leading me to that godawful apartment you’re living in.” He barks out a laugh.

“You don’t like my place?” he says.

“I don’t like your whole alternative lifestyle, Frank,” she says.

“So, you’re not gonna take my shit, huh?” he says.

“Nope,” she says. “You get in this car, your life of crime comes to an end, you got that?”

“That so?” he says, leaning into her space a little. She doesn’t back up. His kiss is softer and more tender than she imagined.  Goose gives the friendly dog a disdainful look and heads back into the building. “I can live with that, Maria,” he says gently, when she opens her eyes. “As long as you stay safe,” he adds. She frowns.

“Don’t question my professional competency,” she snaps, hopping into the driver’s seat. “You asshat.” She slams the car door and pulls away.

 

“Oh, man, I stuck my foot in that, huh?” Frank says to the dog. He wags his tail. “Honey, come back! I misspoke!” he yells at the sedan. To his surprise, he sees tail lights. She rolls down the window.

“Get in the damn car and stop making a scene at my job, Frank!” Maria yells. He laughs joyfully.

 

 

***

Darcy has made multiple chocolate things for the bakery while he’s on the mission. There are double chocolate muffins waiting for him, too (he left her with a key to lock up). She thinks he will be back on Wednesday, so she’s surprised when she goes outside to throw away some trash at the bakery on Tuesday and he’s standing there in the dark. “You’re here?” she says joyfully. “You should have knocked! It’s not safe outside!” she fusses. He laughs.

“You’re worrying about me?” he says, tapping his chest. “Me?” He looks torn between incredulity and pleasure.

“Uh-huh. I made you muffins,” she tells him. “They’re at your place.”

“Well, we should go inside then,” he says. He looks around cautiously. “I’ve heard it’s not safe here.”

“You tease,” she jokes and leans up to kiss him. When he deepens the kiss, he practically lifts her off her feet. They go inside. “Lemon squares or chocolate torte?” she asks.

“Surprise me?” he says, with evident warmth. He looks at her and she feels excitement all the way to her toes. Darcy will never get tired of looking at him, she thinks.

“Sit,” she says. “I’ll get you a surprise.” She serves him something she’s experimenting with particularly for him. A cannoli shell filled with ricotta and espresso and drizzled with chocolate and cinnamon. He grins at her and Alison.

“I’m so glad you guys got together,” Alison squeals. “It’s too cute.”

“You hear that? We’re too cute,” he says.

“I think you’re adorable,” she tells him, sitting in his lap at the table inside the still-darkened bakery. Everything feels vaguely magical to Darcy. The blue light of dawn, the sugary-sweet smell of chou pastry, the sense of starting fresh. All the little petits fours glint in their trays. “You have to try these new coffee-caramel mini eclairs, Brock.”

“Hit me, sweetheart,” he says, peering into the pastry cases in between kisses.

 

He carries her inside his apartment later, too.

  

***

“The cat has been hanging around your office,” Natasha tells Steve, once they’ve been through debrief. It is almost four am on a Tuesday shading into Wednesday.

“That right?” he says. “This that cat that you and Hill think is a matchmaker?”

“Yes,” she says.

“Because it’s not you doing all the work?” Steve teases.

“Not this time,” Nat says. “Good luck, Rogers.”

“I don’t think the cat can bring me who I need,” Steve says dryly. He opens his office door and Nat raises an eyebrow. Goose is sitting on the desk. She tells the cat good luck in Russian. “That better not be a curse, comrade!” Steve calls. He likes to razz her with history jokes. She doesn’t mind. “Well?” Steve says to the cat. “Lead the way, Goose?” He gestures and the cat hops down. He follows.  


Steve is still following on his motorcycle as the cat leads him across town in daylight. They go to a park. It is sunny out. He leaves the motorcycle in a space and follows Goose on foot. They head up a trail. Steve breathes deeply. It is nice to breathe, he thinks, nice to be outside in the warmth. The cat stays just the perfect distance ahead, so he is curious enough to hurry, but not feeling like he's missing the views. There is a familiar figure leaning against the railing on the bridge ahead. For a moment, Steve forgets to breathe. The figure turns, but to his surprise, doesn’t run. Instead, he leans down and pets the cat with a metal hand. “Hey, Buck,” Steve says, voice breaking. Steve is almost afraid to move.

“It’s been awhile. You okay, Punk? Left you a little water-logged,” he says. “Sorry ‘bout that.” He is very carefully not meeting Steve’s eyes.

“Yeah,” Steve says. “I’ve been, uh, trying to get in touch with you, but you never phone and you don’t write.”

“Stamps are so damned expensive now,” Bucky says and Steve’s giddy laugh catches him by surprise and floats up into the open air.

 

 

-The End-


End file.
